lace on his close-cut hair. He
carried himself erectly, swinging a little on his hips.

As they went, he passed in review the important items of the day:
so-and-so had strained a muscle, so-and-so had spoilt a second piano.
But his particular interest centred upon that evening's
ABENDUNTERHALTUNG. A man named Schilsky, whom it was no exaggeration to
call their finest, very finest violinist was to play Vieuxtemps'
Concerto in D. Dove all but smacked his lips as he spoke of it. In
reply to a query from Maurice, he declared with vehemence that this
Schilsky was a genius. Although so great a violinist, he could play
almost every other instrument with case; his memory had become a
by-word; his compositions were already famous. At the present moment,
he was said to be at work upon a symphonic poem, having for its base a
new and extraordinary book, half poetry, half philosophy, a book which
he, Dove, could confidently assert, would effect a revolution in human
thought, but of which, just at the minute, he was unable to remember
the name. Infected by his friend's enthusiasm, Maurice here recalled
having, only the day before, met some one who answered to Dove's
description: the genial Pole had been storming up the steps of the
Conservatorium, two at a time, with wild, affrighted eyes, and a halo
of dishevelled auburn hair.--Dove made no doubt that he had been seized
with a sudden inspiration.

Gewandhaus and Conservatorium lay close together, in a new quarter of
the town. The Conservatorium, a handsome, stone-faced building, three
lofty storeys high, was just now all the more imposing in appearance as
it stood alone in an unfinished street-block, and as, opposite,
hoardings still shut in all that had yet been raised of the great
library, which would eventually overshadow it. The severe plainness of
its long front, with the unbroken lines of windows, did not fail to
impress the unused beholder, who had not for very long gone daily out
and in; it suggested to him the earnest, unswerving efforts, imperative
on his pursuit of the ideal; an ideal which, to many, was as it were
personified by the concert-house in the adjoining square: it was
hither, towards this clear-limned goal, that bore him, like a magic
carpet, the young enthusiast's most ambitious dream.--But in the life
that swarmed about the Conservatorium, there was nothing of a tedious
austerity. It was one of the briskest times of day, and the short
street and the steps o